A Quote by J. Cole
There's always people out there that's like, doubting me, you know what I mean? Even though I do embrace the people that embrace me and I'm grateful for them. But I always feel like, man, there's still people out there that's not giving it up. And I feel like I'm doing everything the right way, you know what I mean? I'm really going out of my way to do it the right way. I'm taking very few cheats - very few cheat codes that I'm using.
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I always say, thank god I have this job or I don't know what I'd be doing. It'd be sad. I've always felt like I have been trying to brand a world for a quite a long time. You know what though, I feel no different. I feel like I'm doing the exact same thing I did in high school. Only I have more people helping me out now. And we have to take it all the way.
I'm grateful that I feel the way that I do - to make choices based on a lot of people's feelings - even though it has been hard at times, especially when I was younger, but I feel like it has led me down the right road for me. I'm very happy with what has come of that.
I still feel like I don't know what I'm doing. Like, I'm unsure of what my life will be like. I mean, I have such an obsession with making movies that I probably will always do that. But sometimes my life can feel so suffocating, and then it can feel so massive, like I don't have a handle on it at all, and I don't know where it's going or what I'm going to do. Right now, I'm known for making movies. And I wonder if that's it. I don't know. It doesn't feel like it to me.
It just seemed like I would. I mean, I didn't know him on a daily basis -- far from it. But, in a way, I don't even feel right being here without him. It's so difficult to really believe he's gone. I still talk about him like he's still here, you know. I can't figure it out. It doesn't make any sense.
I'm always interested in hearing how other people read and react to my songs. I hadn't thought of it in just that way. One of the things I love about doing things that are creative is that I feel like it's my right as an artist not to be affected by the reactions of those people that are going to hear my songs. But I also feel like it's the right of the people hearing them to have their own interpretations of what these songs mean. Sometimes people will see things that I don't see.
People ask, 'Why would you cast yourself in your movie?' And, for me, it's more like an achievement that I am now not playing all the parts, you know? Like I was for so long, in all my performances and a lot of my short movies. So, that's where I'm coming from, not out of a kind of actress-y sense of myself. I mean, I don't really see myself as an actress, but more from performance: this is how you make something. You do it yourself. You're in it and you write it. I think I keep doing it that way, 'cause it's my way. It's what makes me feel like I know how to do it.
Image and music always works together for me. I think they're equally important and I've always done things in a way that people remember them by, but I don't set out to just shock people...because that's very easy, a lot of people could do that, I just like to do things the way that makes me happy really. And sometimes that's too much for certain people, but, you know, I try to push the envelope to make the boundaries wider as far as what you can and can't do in music.
Music feels like therapy, actually. A lot of people come out of a therapy session and feel like a weight has been lifted - I got it out, I cried, I feel good. I think for me this is just my way of doing that. It's the only avenue I have that fulfills that, that makes me feel good about myself. And I don't mean that in regards to the rewards, or like getting some good review. That's not what it's about. It's more about trying to please myself. It's really sick and weird.
It definitely feels like I'm sort of reaching people through social media in the right kind of way. I feel like I've been late to the game with the whole Facebook/Twitter thing, because I always thought it was cheap. But, when I started really using it and trying to be myself when using it, which is the hardest thing. I feel like a lot of people are really responding to that.
It's ridiculous that people call me a sex symbol. I don't feel like that at all. My daughter would get a kick out of it - she'd find it very funny. I'll take it though. I'm very humble. But it's certainly not the way I feel.
I think people have to sharpen their eyes and look. I always feel like a big sponge: I feel like I learn lots of things by osmosis, and I feel that I'm always absorbing. I mean, when people say, 'What is your inspiration?' I could throw up. I mean, I'm inspired by the fact I get up in the morning. And I'm still here.
I feel like one thing that a lot of creative people go through is that they feel like they don't have the right to be creative or to put their stuff out there. I'm glad that blogging from a young age kind of got that out of the way for me.
I do feel like I owe something, but not to the industry. When you say "industry," I think of a group of people who don't really care much about you and treat you as a commodity. So, in that regard, I don't feel like I owe anything. But the people who've always been supportive of me and have always seen me for my greatest potential-those are the people who I feel like I owe something to. I feel like I am their voice. I owe it them to represent them in a way that they can be proud of.
It's always liberating to feel like I'm changing my hair and know that my fans are supporting that. I like to feel like I'm really expressing myself, and when people embrace it, it feels like an authentic connection.
I have to always, always pay homage to a woman I never met but she touched me like she touched so many others with that amazing voice, Whitney Houston. The very first time I heard her voice, I knew I wanted to make people feel that way. Even if I couldn't do all of that that she did, the way she was able to tell my story without even knowing me, the way she could feel what I didn't know how to express, it was spiritual almost.
I really feel like because I had my son so young, I didn't want everyone's help. I think people felt entitled to give advice, so I'm always very sensitive to moms and letting them feel their way out.
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